I’m still not convinced Yermin Mercedes isn’t a LARP. Or a Transformer. His name really is Yermin Mercedes? Just out here with a name that sounds like a German saying German Mercedes? And he doesn’t wear a Mercedes emblem around his neck like Flavor Flav? Is this real life or a simulation? The White Sox lost Eloy and just randomly found a guy who can do exactly the same? Right, right, okay, so the story I heard about one fantasy baseballer hearing the news of Eloy’s injury while on the Mercedes-Benz factory tour and crying onto a C-Class, and that transforming into Yermin, was a lie? I don’t hear lies, I hear truths! So, Yermin Mercedes went 2-for-4 and hit another home run (2nd) yesterday, and has basically done what we would’ve hoped for from Andrew Vaughn in our wildest dreams. But can it continue? Ah, excellent leading question! Yes, Yermin can hit .550. No! Of course not! He does have a solid hit tool (can hit .280) and good power (20-ish homers). The moment he slumps and Vaughn hits (it’ll happen — hopefully for my teams) Yermin will be on the outside, while Vaughn moves in. There is a chance Mercedes could hit 25 homers/.280, which is essentially Trey Mancini-type projections, so he’s worth rostering for now. tl;dr: Mercedes goes vroom, vroom, make room. Anyway, here’s what else I saw yesterday in fantasy baseball:
Lance Lynn – 9 IP, 0 ER, 5 baserunners (zero walks), 11 Ks, ERA at 0.00. Ask for a favor, can he have a zero ERA all year? Thanking you in advance! Out of pure spite for the haters, I’m not even going to talk about how I said he was a number one starter all preseason and everyone was like, “Yo, Grey is handsome, but maybe drunk.”
Yoan Moncada – 1-for-4, 2 RBIs and his 1st homer. More like Moan Yoncada, amiright? (I’m not right.)
Anibal Sanchez – Throwing for “select teams.” It’s pretty cool he’s throwing for the team of people at supermarkets that put “select” stickers on meat.
Eduardo Rodriguez – 5 IP, 3 ER, 4 baserunners, 7 Ks as he was activated from the IL. Kevin from ESPN’s “Get Him In Your Lineup” Department said, “Sorry about cutting into Karen’s cake. The light is out in the refrigerator and I didn’t see the writing on it said, ‘Happy Birthday.'”
Enrique Hernandez – 1-for-5 and his 1st homer. *slowly opens lace curtains, sticks bare leg out* Enrisqué!
Rafael Devers – 2-for-3, 2 runs, 2 RBIs and his 1st homer. Glad I didn’t drop him after six bad games. Whew.
Christian Vazquez – 3-for-5, 1 run and his 2nd steal, hitting .458. I still haven’t looked it up, so could someone else? I’m asking you of course to look if it’s me, or does Vazquez have the best first two weeks every year then fade?
Trevor Bauer – Being investigated for tampering with balls. Bad news is there was something sticky on his balls. Good news is they found Bauer’s balls.
Mitch Garver – 2-for-4, 3 RBIs and his 2nd homer. Our writer, Coolwhip, tried to put you up on the scoop with his Mitch Garver fantasy, did you listen? Uh, read?
Jose Berrios – 5 2/3 IP, 2 ER, 8 baserunners, 8 Ks, ERA at 1.54. His line is decent, and he looked even better. Call me Stanberry, because I love this guy.
Byron Buxton – 3-for-5, 2 runs and his 4th homer, and a triple short of the cycle, hitting .421. Someone wrap Buxton in bubble wrap. And wrap the outfield fences in bubble wrap. And wrap his teammates in bubble wrap in case they run into him. We cannot be too precautious.
Luis Arraez – 1-for-3, 3 RBIs and his 1st homer, hitting .381. The screen flashed, “Luis Arraez is the only Twins regular without a hit” just as he hit his homer. Could someone flash on the screen, “Grey is yet to win the lottery?”
James Paxton – Went for a 2nd opinion on his forearm — he gets more 2nd opinions than Bill Paxton got on Big Love. Bad but not entirely unexpected news on James Paxton, he needs Tommy John surgery.
Marco Gonzales – 4 1/3 IP, 7 ER, ERA at 10.45. Marco…Call the Po-Po…Marco…Call the Po-Po…Marco…Call the Po-Po my team has been violated. As I said in the preseason, if Marco’s pinpoint control was less than, he was going to struggle. Last game, he had more walks than Ks, and this game he had a ~4.5 BB/9. It’s not gonna work for him. You can hold out hope in deeper leagues, but I’d bench until his command returns.
Jose Marmolejos – 1-for-4 and his 1st homer. The Gypsy Kings are doing a comeback tour?! Aw sookie!
George Springer – Suffered a low-grade strain of his quad while recovering from his oblique injury. An offscreen voice whispers, “What Grey doesn’t know is we’re pranking him to see his reaction when his number one outfielder hurts himself again and again.”
Vladimir Guerrero Jr. – 2-for-4, 3 RBIs and his 2nd homer. One week’s worth of games, and I’m already calling it: Vlad Jr. is gonna be a top 12 overall pick next year. We’re headed for a 32-homer, .315 season. Book it!
Cavan Biggio – 1-for-4, 2 runs and his 2nd homer. His father called after the game and said, “Nice homer, Buster Brown, but in this house we only recognize hits by pitch. Are you Lance Berkman’s kid?”
Mike Trout – 3-for-5, 2 runs and his 3rd homer. Gonna check out this site called Wikipedia dot com and find out about this guy.
Jose Altuve – 1-for-4 and his 1st homer. He homered to loud cheers from the home crowd of close to 11,000. Otherwise known as 22,000 eyes watching the catcher’s signs.
Yordan Alvarez – 2-for-4, 2 runs and his 2nd homer. Captain Woo Cubano taking ’em to the Matt! Olson and Chapman. See, they were playing the A’s.
Carlos Correa – 2-for-3, 2 runs, 2 RBIs, hitting .321. Could it finally be happening? The season everyone’s been expecting since Correa was promoted? Could be. Not sure I’d believe until it actually happened. Consider myself burnt for about five seasons.
Cristian Javier – 5 IP, 0 ER, 5 baserunners, 7 Ks, ERA at 2.08. Streamonator liked this start, but loves his next one. Color me intrigued.
Cole Irvin – 5 1/3 IP, 4 ER, ERA at 7.45. Cool story, bro, can we please call up Daulton Jefferies now?
Nolan Arenado – 1-for-4, 2 RBIs and his 2nd homer. My team and I have spent five years restoring the letters Ted Williams sent his favorite bait and tackle store during World War II. I’m just going to carelessly put them by this open window–NOOOOO!!! Torenado!!!
Dee Gordon – Signed with the Brewers. The Brewers making a lot of strange moves lately, first trading Arcia away, then getting Strange-Gordon.
Corbin Burnes – 6 IP, 0 ER, 1 hit, zero walks, 9 Ks, ERA at 0.73. I stand by what I’ve been saying on Burnes. I wish I had him in every league. I am a huge fan. Yet, I still have an iCal reminder for trading him away around the All-Star Break, because he won’t be able to throw anywhere near a full season.
Trevor Rosenthal – Underwent thoracic outlet surgery. Thoracic outlet surgery is performed by cockroaches near a power outlet. I think, I skimmed the Quora. Jake Diekman is the current closer replacement; Sergio Romo would be my next guess.
Ryan Mountcastle – 1-for-4, 2 RBIs and his 1st homer. Mountcastle, Thursdays at 10 on the BBC — Catch the fever! Then watch as Mountcastle figures out the fever was planted by a Russian spy.
Matt Harvey – 5 IP, 4 ER, ERA at 5.59. David Wright’s wife ruined two players’ careers.
Dom Nunez – 1-for-4, 3 RBIs and his 3rd homer. He won’t be in this afternoon’s Buy/Sell column, because he’s here now. By the way, the Buy/Sell column is already available on Patreon.
Garrett Hampson – 1-for-4, 2 runs and his 4th steal. It would be legitimately funny to me if Bud Black plays Hampson for 150 games this year, and says something like, “He came this year ready to play,” like he wasn’t exactly this good for the last four years when Black didn’t play him.
Zac Gallen – Tossed 67 pitches in camp. What’s he a prude? Throw two more!
Ketel Marte – Hit the IL with a hamstring strain. That’s a weird way to spell cramp.
Kevin Ginkel – 1 IP, 0 ER, as he pitched the 7th. *looks up if this was a doubleheader* It was not a doubleheader, i.e., the 7th inning wasn’t the 9th inning, said Mr. Exposition. This was likely him getting work and Ginkel would still be my guess for closer, but the Diamondbacks had to Ginkel. Also, Stefan Crichton is there, and the Diamondbacks might not win any games. Have you seen their lineup? It was pretty bad with Crampel Marte.
Eduardo Escobar – 1-for-2, 2 RBIs and a slam (1) and legs (1). What if someone slammed and legged, and no one cared?
Anthony Rizzo – 2-for-4, 2 runs and his 1st homer. HR to the Izzo!
Javier Baez – 2-for-3, 3 RBIs and a slam (2) and legs (3). Wish I would’ve drafted him in every league. Baez gonna have a huge year for that huge contract.
Kris Bryant – 2-for-4 and his 2nd homer. Apparently, the stories of Bryant’s demise were greatly exaggerated. Since it was Bryant spreading those rumors, he lied to us! Kris Bryant: Noted Fabulist.
Jake Arrieta – 6 IP, 2 ER, 10 baserunners, 4 Ks, ERA at 2.25. Solid first two outings against the Pirates, who don’t have to look very hard to find booty. I’d use the Streamonator for Arrieta, and his next start is a big woof.
Nick Neidert – 4 1/3 IP, 1 ER, as he enters the Marlins’ rotation for one of the injured guys. Not much here for fantasy, but you can get a pretty good backing track going just repeating Nick Neidert.
Jorge Alfaro – Out with hamstring tightness. I had a Hormel with a tight hamstring, you just gotta chew it off.
Anthony Bass – 1/3 IP, 2 ER and his 2nd blown save. From the Razzball writers’ group DM: “Anthony Bass is toast.” “Call him Anthony Avocado.” “If you roster him, you’ll never own a house.” Any hoo! Marlins have no other options, so, yeah, prolly not Anthony Avocado just yet, and I wouldn’t speculate on anyone else.
Dellin Betances – Hit the IL with a shoulder impingement. You’d think if you paid $2.4 billion for a MLB team, you’d hire new trainers.
Jeff McNeil – 1-for-3 and his 1st homer, as he hit 7th. The Mets’ lineup isn’t bad, so McNeil 7th behind Villar? Then again, it paid off because McNeil was there to take Bass deep in the 9th. Luis Rojas managing the Mets and playing 4D chess.
Taijuan Walker – 6 IP, 2 ER, 6 baserunners, 4 Ks. Solid first start for his new team, the Mets. Now, he will hurt his arm and the Mets’ trainers will say it’s his knee. Streamonator loved this start, and is pretty meh on his next.
Michael Conforto – 0-for-2, 1 RBI, and a game-winning HBP as he leaned over the plate, getting nicked by a strike on his elbow. I don’t blame him, take what you can to get on base, but how was it the umpire was about to call a strikeout, then changed it to a HBP? How do you get to the major leagues as an umpire, and think if you’re about to call something a strike, you can just switch it to a HBP? Even in Little League, they shout STAY RIGHT HERE if a kid is hit by a strike. The kid can be crying on the ground in pain, and screaming, “I was state checkers champion last year, if I can’t move my hand when I try to repeat, you’re gonna hear from my attorney!” Not saying that was me. I’m just saying a thing a kid might say. Though, I was the New Jersey State Checkers Champion.
